The Slovenia Times

National Gallery temporarily closed by flood

Culture

Ljubljana - Heavy rain that Slovenia has not seen for months has been causing disruption across the country since Thursday. A number of buildings have been flooded and roads have been closed by floods or blocked by landslides. In Ljubljana, the National Gallery has announced it will remain closed until Monday due to flooding.

While the gallery has not specified in a post on its website what has been damaged, the public broadcaster RTV Slovenija reported on its late night news show on Thursday that the gallery said that all the artworks were safe.

The gallery's director Barbara Jaki explained for the STA this morning that water flooded the engine room, halls in the basement and the entrance lobby. Luckily, no artwork was damaged, but the gallery was temporarily closed to visitors for safety reasons.

Jaki said the reason for the flooding was a blocked shaft left behind by workers renovating the staircase at the entrance on Prešernova Road, which has now been cleaned up. The Culture Ministry has offered its help to the gallery to deal with the damage.

In Ljubljana the Zaloška and Celovška throughfares were closed to traffic as the railway underpasses were flooded. Several cars had to be towed out of the flooded underpasses, while some drivers made use of the pavement to cross a flooded underpass in the city centre.

The basements and ground floors of several other buildings, both public and private, were flooded in Ljubljana and other parts of the country and several roads were closed down.

Ljubljana airport had to divert several aircraft to Italy due to bad weather, the portal 24ur has reported.

The Environment Agency has reported that more than 100 millimetres of rain fell in parts of the country during the night to Friday.

From 8pm on Thursday to 5:30am this morning, the 100ml mark was crossed at Šebreljski Vrh (146.6ml) and Idrija (125.1ml) in the west of the country, Vrhnika (119.2ml) south-west of Ljubljana, and mount Blegoš (102.6ml).

In Breginj in the west of the country 153 millimetres fell in just two hours yesterday, which equals two-thirds of a monthly average and is close to a record high measured in Slovenia.

It keeps raining heavily with more precipitation forecast for today and tomorrow so more flooding is expected and some rivers and streams have already burst their banks.

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